Shaun wrote:Has anyone come across a recipe for black bacon, using beer and black treacle in the curing process?

Shaun

I make a Burrington Black bacon every week as one of my standard products from my woodland Tamworth pigs. It is delicious esp with the additional fat.Your idea of using a beer is a good one and does work, esp if a stout or strong traitional ale. Only a small amount is needed though.

1. warm the treacle first.2. mix all ingredients together thoroughly3. put on surgical gloves and have large vac pack bags at the ready4. pour the cure which is like thick tar, into a tray large enough to dip the pork into helping to cover all over.5. now covered drop each one onto a large vac bag. repeat6. vac pack very tightly i do number 30.7. this tight packing will help force into skin as well as flesh. leave for seven day. turning every day.8. Remove from bags wash off and pat dry. Yo will notice the meat is incredibly dark on both sides.Leave to mature for at least one week. patience is everything9. It will harden beautifully10. This bacon is dependent on the quality of pork you use. Do not waste your time buying from a super market, your wasting your time. The fat is paramount11. I slice on number 7. on my 1960's manual slicing machine similar to image12. vac pac on number 25Finally this bacon is stunning i love making it and love the compliments. It is called burrington black bacon as i live and make it in Burrington near Cheddar

Just pulled the black bacon from cure for rinsing....here's what it looks like at this stage;

just for comparison...here's the black & maple side by side......

You can clearly see the effect the molasses has had on the color. Both are in the fridge developing the pellicle, the maple will be hot smoked monday (tomorrow) and the black will spend an extra day in the fridge and cold smoked on tuesday. On a side note...i think i need to find a better supplier of bellies

I have to say it looks great, however I was a little disappointed in the flavor. I anticpated molasses coming through, but it really didn't. It is definitely smokier than my other hot smoked bacon's. Overall it is tasty enough and wont go to waste, but was a little bland for my liking.

I think next time I'll try vac packing it in the cure, and maybe add a little more salt.

I always use a 'dry' black treacle cure for my bacon. I use the usual amount of dry curing salt, then place the pork in a large vacuum pack bag, pour in a liberal amount of treacle (approx 1/2-3/4 tin) - I now buy the treacle in 5 litre containers - and vacuum seal. It doesn't matter how carefully, or not, you spread/don't spread the treacle, because in a matter of hours it becomes loose enough for the contents to mix together. I stack in the bottom of the fridge for 4-6 days, turning 1ce or 2ce daily. Then continue as usual, with the washing/drying/smoking etc. The flavour is to die for!

I'm looking at the Burlington black bacon recipe and pondering the salt and cure quantities. My regular dry cured bacon is made with 2% salt and .25% cure #1. In this recipe the salt is 5% and cure is .5% - what say you baconators?